


Caught

by edourado



Series: Hell's Kitchen Chronicles [42]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: F/M, breaking out situation, caught by the authoroties, kastle - Freeform, team effort, there's a lot going on guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-08-22 06:49:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8276654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edourado/pseuds/edourado
Summary: Tumblr Prompt: Frank and Karen are in an established relationship and are caught by the authorities.





	

He’s kissing her through her tears, hands on her face, trying to commit the feeling of her to his memory. 

“They’re here”, he says as she throws her arms around his neck, crying harder than he’d ever seen her, kissing his mouth, hugging him tight to her. “They’re here, baby, you have to be ready. You have to be strong now, ok?”

His hands are shaking. During all their time together, the blissful year he spend by her side, he thought he had been training himself for when this day came - it was inevitable, after all.

It didn’t work. 

“You have to do this.”

“N-no”, she let out, her sobs coursing through her body, shaking her head. “No, Frank, please, please, don’t leave me-”

“They’re gonna get me, sweetheart, we have no choice.”

Again, she hugged him to her, and cried on his neck. 

“Listen. Listen”, he said, getting her face in his hands again, looking into blue eyes, filled with tears, her cheeks and her nose red. She was trembling. “I love you. I love you, but you know we have to do this. You have to do this. They’re gonna get me, they can’t get you, too.”

_ “Frank Castle!” _ came the voice from the door.  _ “You’re surrounded! Put down your weapons!”   _

He kissed her again, harder, trying to imprint her taste, her scent, the feel of her skin, the wild beating of her heart against his chest. “I love you. I love you.”

“I love you”, she whispered back. 

“Promise me you’ll do as I told you. Promise, right now.”

Letting out a shaky breath, she caressed his face and nodded.

“Please come back to me”, she whispered and his heart broke, because this was it. He was checking out. There was no way they would let him live after this. 

After everything. No way. 

Smiling, he touched his forehead to hers, trying to calm himself down. 

“I’ll be with you”, he whispered.

With a blast, the door shot open and he turned her around, crossing an arm around her throat, her hands flying to hold it, his gun to her temple. 

Nine officers walked in, guns and shields and helmets and heavy boots on Karen’s new carpet, the color he had picked out. 

“Frank”, said the one in charge. “You’re surrounded. Lower your weapon and let her go.”

He could feel they were all nervous. The laser points aimed at him were shaking, not one of them steady. Which was not good.

Karen was still trembling against him, her fingers tight around her forearm. All his strength was on his trigger finger, to keep it frozen, that one bullet needed to stay where it was, stay, stay. 

The hand he had around her squeezed her shoulder and it looked like he was holding onto his hostage, but he was just trying to feel her, one more time.

“Put  _ down  _ your weapon!” the man in charge said again, and this was it. 

No more time. 

Karen sobbed, squeezing his arm so tight. And then he saw it. The one that would do it. The gun that trembled the least. The laser point blinded him for one second, as if calling his attention, 

“I love you”, he whispered in her ear again and then moved his elbow up. And then there was a shot. Her scream, echoing. Pain.

Nothing.

.:.

Matt hopped off the cab, Foggy behind him, phone glued to his ear, talking to the hospital. He had been paying attention to the conversation, but now he focused on the station. Sifted through the noise and it wasn’t hard to find what he was looking for. Everyone was talking about the event of the night: the capture of The Punisher. 

“Here, come on”, Foggy said and Matt held onto his arm, letting himself be guided inside the precinct, listening. When the door opened for them, he heard it, one floor above. 

“She’s pretty shaken up”, was saying the detective. “But her statement says he wasn’t violent.”

“Hmm”, skeptically hummed the other officer. “What’s the story?”

“He reached out to her a week ago, saying he needed help. She said she was always the one he was willing to talk to during his trial, so she went, thought maybe she could reason with him. Apparently he needed information on one of the guys she wrote about a while back, they met a few times. And then he showed up today at her place, figured out we were on to him. She tried to convince him to turn himself in, he got angry… Rest is history.”

“Damn”. Matt and Foggy walked into the elevator then and he could hear a little better when the doors closed, blocking the ground floor noise. 

“I don’t care about your protocol”, Foggy was saying on the phone. “I’m technically still his attorney. Just make it happen.”

“She asked about him”, the detective upstairs continued. “Can you believe that?”

“More common than we think. Guys like that, they have something about them. Some victims end up caring for them.”

“I guess. She told that story three times already. I don’t think she’s changing it.”

The elevator door opened and they walked out.

“You think there’s more to it?”

“Don’t know. It’s just… She seems to attract trouble, that one. Gotta wonder if she didn’t start liking it.”

“Excuse me, detective Ronson”, Foggy approached the two men. “We’re here for Karen Page.”

The two men exchanged a look and one of them moved to open the door to the interrogation room. Matt followed him. 

“And you are?”

“Her lawyers. Come on. You know that, don’t be cute”, Foggy answered. 

She was trembling all over. Sitting with her hands on top of her legs, she raised her head when Matt walked in. 

And then she crumbled. 

Got up from the chair and took a step towards him while he took three to her. Her arms were around his neck and she was sobbing, her whole body shaking, her skin was hot. 

“I got you, I got you”, he assured her, a hand on her back, trying to soothe her, even though he knew it was impossible, right now. “I’ll get you out of here, come on.”

"Mr. Murdock, we still have some questions”, said the detective. 

“Is my client being accused of anything?”, he asked, shedding his jacket, putting it around her shoulders. 

The detective hesitated.     

“Not at the moment, but we-”

“Then you will understand that this has been an incredibly traumatic night for Miss Page, and she needs rest. She can answer any question you might still have in the morning, although I can’t imagine what more you may need from her.”

“From now on”, Foggy was saying while Matt took her away. “If you need to talk to her, you will call either me or Mr. Murdock. I hope you understand. You have a good night, detectives.”

Karen was silent all the way to his place, crying quietly, her head resting on Matt’s shoulder while Foggy held her hand.

“Ok”, his friend said when they got out in front of his building. “I’ll get you some food, ok? You go wash all this day away.”

She nodded and they walked in his building. 

Once they were inside his apartment, Matt took the jacket from around her and she raised her face.

“Do you have any news?”, she asked, her voice small. He sighed, taking his glasses off, and nodded. 

“Yeah. He’s alive.”

She started sobbing again, this time out of relief. He caught her in his arms and she went willingly. 

She cried on his shoulder for a moment, and Matt knew what she was gonna say before she said it. 

“We need to get him back”, she breathed out, backing away from him, looking at his face. “They’ll kill him this time, we have to get him back.”

Since he got Foggy’s call, he had been thinking about the situation. There was no love for Frank Castle among the police, and the price on his head was even higher inside the prison he was going to be taken to. And that was best case scenario.If the new trial he was going to face didn’t immediately extradite him to a state where they would give him the death penalty, he’d be lucky. 

Plus, there was always the possibility that one of his enemies would try to move on him while he was still in the hospital. 

They had all been through a lot. Nobody could say they were best friends, Matt and Frank. But it had been two years since “The Punisher” was born, and, more often than not, his path would cross Daredevil’s. There was a civility between them. And Matt still didn’t agree, couldn’t agree, but he understood. He still saw the man, still saw the father, husband, the soldier. He was, in spite of everything, a good man. 

And Karen. Nobody had been able to do what she has done. Make him open up, gain his trust. Even, eventually, his love. They didn’t really talked about it, but he knew. He loved her and she loved him. And to have her here, trembling in his living room, her heart on the brink of breaking, putting all her hope in him, there was no other answer he could give. 

Matt nodded. 

“I know. We will.”

.:.

He couldn’t really feel his body and his vision was somewhat blurred. He was standing on grass, there was sun on his skin, and he had a box of tools by his feet. Looking around, he saw the tree where they liked to eat under, sometimes. 

His home. 

Suddenly, a scream. 

“Daddy!” looking at his right, he saw them, running out of the house, excited looks on their faces. “Is it ready?!”

Lisa smiled up at him and he knelt in front of her, his heart going crazy, threatening to beat out of his chest.

“Yeah, baby”, he said, hand on her cheeks, looking at her, his girl, his baby girl. 

“Can we try it?” 

Frank Jr’s hand grabbed his sleeve and he reached for his boy, his round black eyes eager, already toeing off his shoes. Frank leaned in and placed a kiss on his forehead, suddenly calm, so calm, so happy. 

His children. 

“Yeah. Just be careful, ok?”

“Thank you, daddy!” said Lisa, already jumping, bouncing up and down on the big trampoline he had just finished putting together for them. 

He lifted Frank Jr to it and he joined his sister. They jumped around each other, screaming and laughing and telling him to “look, daddy, look!”

He stood there on the sun, watching his children, his babies, his whole heart. He watched as they played and laughed and he laughed along. 

“Lisa, not too high!” he warned, smiling, he couldn’t stop smiling. 

“I know what I’m doing, daddy!” she said, little Miss Independent.

The sound of fast running on the grass and then the pitbull was circling the trampoline, standing on his back paws to reach it, barking at the kids, tail wagging excitedly from side to side.

“Max!” Frank Jr called. “Daddy, can he jump too? Please?”

“Not today, baby”, said her voice behind him, a hand on his back, a glass of lemonade to him. 

He turned to her. His love, his love, there she was, looking at the kids, smiling, blond hair glowing around her face. 

“Look, mommy!” 

“Wow!” she exclaimed. “That’s great, baby!”

Turning to her, Frank collected her in his arms, hugging her tight, heart in his throat. 

“Thanks for this, honey.”

“Of course”, he said. “I love you”. He was kissing her, oh, his love. 

“We love you too”, she replied, smiling and then turning to the kids again. “Max is freaking out, that’s so cute.”

He looked at the dog and smiled. He was having fun, watching the kids jump up and down, standing up and supporting his front paws on the little steps to watch them. 

Frank noticed the bandages around the right paw. There was a little red spot on them, that wound was bleeding again. Probably from so much running. Looking at the pet’s head, he saw the mangled ear, a piece of it missing. And the bruise in his back, the one that would scar, from his fighting days. Frank was happy he had rescued him from the Irish that night.

That night when he killed them all. When he… When he killed them because of his… His family…

“Are you hungry?” Maria asked. He looked at her, but it wasn’t-

Karen. Looking up at him, big blue eyes, smiling. 

His heart clenched and he reached for her again. 

“I’m having lunch with Foggy. I can bring you something if you want.”

“Daddy, look!”

His breathing was hard, and he felt pain on his head, his shoulder, his abdomen and his knee. 

“Can you watch them while I’m out?”

Breathing hard, not feeling the day’s warmth anymore, he nodded. Looking around, the kids were still jumping, but there was no sun. And it was somewhat distant, the sound of their laughter was faint, now, and they seemed to be moving slower. 

“Hey”, she called by his side. “You ok?”

There were tears on her cheeks, but she was not crying.  He reached for her and she took one of his hands, placing it above her heart. 

“Hey. Come back to me.”

“What?” he asked, the pain was intensifying, he couldn’t move his arms anymore. 

“Please come back to me.”

Her voice was so distant. She was standing right there, but it sounded so far away. 

Hugging her to him, he saw Maria, jumping up and down with the kids on the trampoline. 

“Daddy, come on!”

“I’ll be with you”, he said, cradling Karen’s head to his chest, looking at his children, looking as Maria’s hair flew as she jumped, their laughter so faint.

“We love you”, she whispered, someone whispered, his arms were so heavy, he couldn’t move them. 

“Frank Castle!” 

Shots fired.

He opened his eyes, a white light on his peripheral vision, something soft under him.

“I’ll be with you”, he said again, trying to hold on to her, but his hands were empty, clenching fabric. 

“That’s good, dude”, said a voice. A voice he knew, to his left. “But you kinda have to be quiet now.”

Turning his head, he tried to push the fog away, tried to wake up. 

He was tied to a bed. Hospital bed, judging by the beeping and the sterile smell. 

“Welcome back”, said his nurse. “Hey. You with me?”

Blinking, Frank looked up. Black hair, blue scrubs, a mask bunched up on her neck.

“Shit, you’re a tough son of a bitch. Claire said this would knock you out for hours.”

“Jones?”

“The very same.”

“What.. What are you… What is…” he tried to speak. But he had to close his eyes, it was all too heavy, his body was so heavy. 

“We’re breaking you out, man. Now please be quiet for me, will you? Don’t want anybody chasing us. Hold this for me”, she placed a saline bag on his chest, the one that was probably hooked to his arm by the IV.

Suddenly, the walls were moving, it was so blurry, his chest was strapped to the bed, he couldn’t lift his arms. 

“Relax, we got you”, Jessica said behind him. She was wheeling his bed to the door. “Matt, how’s it looking?”

He didn’t hear a reply. 

“We’re ready here. Let me know.”

Frank breathed in and out, trying to wake up, but his eyes were refusing to open. 

When Jessica started to move him again, he saw the bright lights on the hall. 

“We have four minutes, tops”, said a voice, by his bed, walking along while Jessica wheeled him down the hall. 

Red?

There was sun again, and laughter. He was standing on the window, watching as Lisa and Frank Jr. chased the dog around the back yard. 

“Can you get breakfast?” Maria asked from the bed. 

“Sure.”

“Ok”, she said, turning around to sleep again. “Thanks, baby.”

She liked to sleep in on Sundays. Those 7 AM masses were officially out. “We can go on the one before lunch. The priest will be hungry, he’ll hurry it up”, she would say. 

He looked at the bed, to the sleeping form of his wife, and then turned around to get breakfast ready. 

When he got to the kitchen, he looked outside, checking on the kids. Lisa was hoola hooping,  Frank Jr was running around with a towel wrapped around his shoulders, Max was rolling on the grass. 

He was done with the eggs when he heard it. The click clack of heels behind him.

“God, I’m so late”. 

Karen rushed in, picked up a fork and ate some of the pancakes he had made, moving to the eggs after. 

“Careful”, he said, “it’s hot.”

“Hmm. They’re great”, she said, washing the mouthful down with a sip of his coffee. “I have to go.”

She ate another forkful of eggs and rushed, collecting keys, one of Lisa’s books, her 380, that photo of him, Maria and the kids at the carrousel, the glass shattered, putting them all in her purse. 

“Will you be here when I come back?”

He nodded.

“You better. No Punishing on my birthday. You promised.”

His head spun, he blinked and felt his arms heavy again. There was still light, but it was closer, he was being jostled. 

“You got it?” Karen asked.

“I got him, I got him”, Jessica Jones was saying. 

There was the sound of doors being closed, like in a car. There were people moving around.

“Hold this up for me”, said a new voice, one he recognized, but couldn’t really pin. “Frank? Can you hear me?”

“Claire, we good?” 

“Yep, let’s go.”

An engine, and movement. He was inside a moving car.

“He’s just waking up again”, Red’s voice again, from further away. 

“He’s fighting it.”

There was quiet for one second and he tried to open his eyes, feeling a hand on his and a pressure on his mouth, light, soft. 

He managed to blink after a second, his vision slowly coming into focus. 

“Hi”, said Maria. “Fancy seeing you here.”

Blonde, light, beautiful. Not Maria. 

Karen. 

He smiled up at her and looked around. 

“Welcome back”, said the nurse. Claire. 

He was in an ambulance. Karen was undoing his restraints, Claire was checking his pulse.

“They gave you some heavy stuff. You’re gonna be in and out for a while.”

“Is he ok?”

“He’s fine. Your man is strong. I’m gonna give you something for the pain, ok?”

Karen’s face came into his vision field again and she took his hand, caressing his face. 

“Ma’am”, he said, just to make her smile, and she did, chuckling, leaning into him. “Where we goin’?” he asked, trying to squeeze her hand. 

She kissed his face and his lips. 

“Somewhere safe”. 

The smell of her perfume comforted him, he breathed deep. 

Closing his eyes, he stopped trying to stay awake. With her hand in his, the movement of the ambulance was lulling him. Jones and Red were talking on the background. Frank realized she was driving, Red was on the passenger seat. 

Whatever Claire gave him, it was working. He wasn’t feeling any pain anymore. 

“Sleep. I got you. We’re ok now,” Karen said, a hand on his forehead.

His love. 

.:.

She closed the curtains again, after peeking outside, and picked up her purse. 

“Hey”, she heard. Looking at the bed, she saw him looking at her, a sleepy frown on his face. 

“Hi”, she replied, walking to the big bed and sitting on the edge. “How you feeling?

He just hummed in response, taking her hand, moving his head to look around. 

“What’s going on?”

“The jist of it is that I broke you out of the hospital. Well, we did. It was a team effort.”

He flashed her one of those side smiles that made her go weak in the knees. 

“Broke me out, huh?”

“Yep. Wasn’t gonna let them take you from me.”

He took a deep breath. 

“That’s my girl.”

“We’re safe here. I just have to go to the station and lie to the cops a little. But I’ll be back, ok?”

He nodded, still very groggy, but focusing on her. 

“I might need to stay away for a bit, to make sure nobody follows me here. But everyone’s here, they’re gonna take care of you.”

There was a knock on the door and Claire walked in. 

“Karen? Matt’s waiting for you.”

“Ok.” She turned to him again and placed a kiss on his lips. “You be a good patient to Claire, ok? Let her take care of you.”

“Don’t worry. We’re pals”, the nurse offered, coming to put her kit on the bedside table. “Go. He’ll be fine.”

With one more kiss, she got up and out, navigation the halls of the fancy penthouse to meet Matt in the living room, and then driving with him to the station to swear she did not know where Frank Castle was, to pretend to be a bit shaken up, refuse protective custody and then go with Matt to his place until the cops stopped following her, sneak out and go back to the safe house. 

His phone started ringing. 

“Yes?” he answered, casually, and Karen thanked God she had him - and his team of super people - to help her through this. “What?” he asked on the receiver, feigning surprise, and she knew he had just been given the news of Frank’s disappearance. “When?”

Looking at her rearview mirrors, she looked for a sign that they were being followed. Thankfully, nothing.

“Uh, yes. Ok. I’ll get her, we’ll be there in an hour. Thank you, detective.”

He hung up. 

“Ok, show time”, he said, sitting on the passenger side of the car they were gonna park two blocks away from his place before getting a cab to go to the station. “If you want, I can do the talking”. 

“No, it’s ok”, she answered. 

This wasn’t her first rodeo.

**Author's Note:**

> I have zero knowledge of the Defenders. But the Netflix-Marvel universe is so lit right now,I couldn't resist. What did you think?


End file.
